Arun outlined the three key themes that went into Java EE 7: Developer Productivity, Embracing HTML 5 and Meeting Enterprise demands. Arun’s top ten features of Java EE7, which followed these trends were:

WebSocket client/server endpoints

Batch Applications

JSON Processing

Concurrency Utilities

Simplified JMS API

@Transactiona; and @TransactionScoped

JAX-RD Client API

Default Resources

More annotated POJOs

Faces Flow

Arun gave a great introduction to each of these new/improved features. A few which caught my eye particularly were the WebSocket endpoint support, new concurrent utilities and JMS 2.0.

The Java API for WebSocket 1.0 adds support for Server and Client WebSocket endpoints. Essentially you can turn POJOs into endpoints via annotations @ServerEndpoint and @ClientEndpoint or programatically. You can also annotate methods which would then be called upon events, such as @onMessage.

In Java EE containers, it’s a really bad thing to start up a new thread and containers have often dealt with this themselves with their own proprietary implementations. The new Concurrency Utilities in Java EE provides executor services to assist with this thread creation.

JMS version 2.0 revised the way you would write your messaging code, by removing boilerplate code and checked exceptions and makes use of annotations such as injecting an JMSContext (new in JMS 2.0) or destinations as well as sending a message in a single line of code.

This session is a must watch for developers who want to top up or refresh their Java EE knowledge or for people to understand the kind of things which Java EE offers these days.

So What’s Next?

With Kick-Ass Software Development you actually get stuff done. Feedback cycles are short, code quality is awesome and customers get the features they lust after. Less mangers managing, less testers testing and less IT-operators operating. The developers take the power back, making them much happier. Sound like paradise? It is!

Simon is a Developer Advocate at ZeroTurnaround, a Java Champion since 2014, JavaOne Rockstar speaker in 2014, Virtual JUG founder and organiser, London Java Community co-leader and RebelLabs author. He is an experienced speaker, having presented at JavaOne, JavaZone, Jfokus, DevoxxUK, DevoxxFR, JavaZone, JMaghreb and many more including many JUG tours. His passion is around user groups and communities. When not traveling, Simon enjoys spending quality time with his family, cooking and eating great food.